Folk-pop singer-songwriter Suzanne Vega appears in this archival edition of Mountain Stage, recorded in December 2007. Vega enjoyed commercial success with hits like "Luka" and "Tom's Diner," which both reached into the Top Ten of pop charts in the U.S. and abroad, earning her a large national and international following.
Vega was born in Los Angeles, raised on New York's Upper West Side and attended Manhattan's High School for the Performing Arts and Barnard College. At Barnard, she became a part of a group of songwriters led by Jack Hardy who contributed to the Fast Folk anthology albums. Vega's solo debut and its follow-up were met with critical and popular success. Soon her music videos became a fixture of early MTV and VH1 programming.
Her song "Tom's Diner" was a totem of late 20th-century pop culture in its own right. The diner, located at 112th & Broadway, was used for the exterior shots of the fictional Monk's Café on Seinfeld, and Vega's recording was used by audio engineer Karlheinz Brandenburg to test the MP3 file compression algorithm. Backed by her own band, this set touches on many of her best-known songs, including "Luka" and "Tom's Diner."
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